Dark Horse

by E. A. Copen

  I grabbed Emma and we raced for the fort opening.

  One of the harpies broke free from whatever Fenrir was doing to them and her attention snapped to us with a snarl. Before she could dive, a jet of magic, black and twisting like a hurricane, spun through the air and struck her. The harpy clutched at her stomach. An awful gurgling sound escaped her throat and her eyes blazed an even brighter crimson as some madness overtook her and she bit into her own arm. Razor-sharp fangs ripped at her skin, peeling it away from the bone.

  I turned away and focused on our destination rather than watching the harpy eat itself. The source of the spell must’ve been Beth. She stood on the ramparts of the fort, having reached it before us, arms outstretched, her staff extended toward the open waters. I suddenly felt very lucky that I’d never been struck directly with Famine’s power, but also a little curious. Before she used that spell on the harpy, I had no idea Beth could even do that. She hadn’t even tried when we fought last time. Why not?

  Emma and I reached the rocky shore surrounding Fort Pike. There were only a few feet of land before the rocky barrier dipped back into the water, but it was enough for us to climb out and stand. I was shivering, but not nearly as bad off as Emma was. She staggered, unable to stand. I rushed to help keep her upright and cringed when I saw the deep gash in her leg. Those harpies had gotten her good.

  Fenrir launched himself through the fort doors, landing in the water. The harpies, freed from whatever spell the wolf Titan had worked over them with his howl, shook and cackled back into action, flapping their wings and flying closer. Beth hit another one with her famine spell, but she wouldn’t be able to get them all. Emma needed to be behind those protective walls. Now.

  Fenrir was suddenly on the narrow bar of land near us. He lowered his head and hunched down. GET ON. I WILL TAKE YOU.

  I eyed the wolf, hesitating. He might be offering his help, but he was still a Titan and far from my ally.

  QUICKLY, HORSEMAN. THE HUMAN CANNOT STAND TO LOSE MUCH MORE BLOOD.

  I looked at Emma who’d gone gray. Her eyelids fluttered and she swayed. She’d pass out any minute. Guess my decision was made for me. With a grunt, I hauled her up onto Fenrir’s back with me. There was nothing to hold onto except his fur, so I leaned forward, pressing Emma against Fenrir’s back and gripping two big handfuls of white fur. “Mush!” I shouted and snapped the two handfuls of fur as if they were reins.

  Fenrir growled, but took a running leap into the water on the side of the fort.

  The water came up to my knees. I shifted so I could make sure Emma’s sliced up legs were on Fenrir’s back and not in the water. “Good doggie.”

  He snarled and hauled us up through another opening, this one slightly larger than the one he’d jumped out of. The roof of the corridor was still uncomfortably close as he trotted down it. I had to duck to keep from hitting my head on the ceiling.

  The hallway spilled into a larger, circular room with some sort of structure in the center, the purpose of which I couldn’t begin to guess. Fenrir squatted so I could slide off, but when I let go of Emma, she fell and I wound up half-falling, half-climbing down in a tangle of limbs while blood pooled on the floor around us. On the cold, stone floor, I searched her over, trying to decide which wound was the worst so I could put pressure on it.

  Quick footsteps slapped against stone and Beth charged into the circular room from an opening in the other direction. She spotted Emma bleeding in my arms, launched herself forward and let her staff clatter to the ground. “Move!” she shouted, pushing me away hard enough that I almost fell over.

  I blinked. I never would’ve expected Beth to be so gung-ho to save Emma. But then there was a lot I didn’t know, especially with Beth and Emma. I barely knew the two of them anymore, it seemed.

  Beth laid her hands on Emma’s wounds, murmuring under her breath and calling up her magic to seal them one by one.

  I licked my lips and leaned forward. “Is she going to be okay?”

  Beth shook her head. “Don’t know.”

  The giant wolf shook himself dry in another corner of the room, sending droplets of water everywhere and leaving his fur all puffed up. HARPY VENOM.

  “Venom?” My heart kicked into high gear. I grabbed Beth by the shoulder. “You can fix this, right?”

  Her eyes opened and she glared at me. “Not if you don’t let me go.”

  I took my hand away and looked down at Emma, unconscious. She couldn’t die, not from something so crazy as harpy venom, not after just coming back into my life.

  WHY HAVE YOU COME?

  Fenrir’s voice in my head drew my attention from Emma to him. His ice blue eyes felt like fire on my skin.

  I swallowed. “Typhon is coming. We need to know how to beat him. Figured the best person to ask about killing a Titan would be another Titan. I just didn’t think coming here would be so dangerous.”

  Fenrir snorted and sat on his hind legs, white tail swishing back and forth across the dusty floor. TYPHON. FATHER OF MONSTERS. LORD OF THE STORM WINDS. YOU WOULD SOONER BOTTLE A BLIZZARD THAN HALT THE CHAOS AND DESTRUCTION THAT IS TYPHON.

  Not what I wanted to hear. I pushed up from the floor, carefully stepping around Beth and Emma. “There’s got to be a way. Someone put him in Tartarus once before.”

  The giant wolf panted. From his expression, I got the feeling he was irritated with me. THE GODS DEFEATED THE TITANS, HUMAN. MANY GODS OVER MANY YEARS. NONE POSSESSED THE POWER TO KILL US. NOT EVEN THE ALLFATHER HIMSELF.

  I squeezed my hands into fists. “I killed a Titan. Ikelos, the Titan of nightmares. I’m sure you’ve heard of him. I took him on and won just a few months ago.”

  IKELOS WAS WEAK. EVEN HE FEARED TYPHON. NO MAN LIVING HAS THE POWER TO DEFEAT THE FATHER OF MONSTERS.

  I crossed my arms. “So, what you’re telling me is there’s a really slim chance of success. Big deal. It’s not the first time. I’m not going to give up just because what I’ve got to do is difficult. Tell me how to do it, Scooby, and I’ll do it. Whatever it takes.”

  SCOOBY? Fenrir peered at me through half-lidded eyes. I SHOULD EAT YOU FOR YOUR INSOLENCE, HORSEMAN. I WOULD IF I HAD NOT ALREADY GIVEN YOU MY WORD NOT TO HARM ANY HUMANS. IF YOUR WISH IS TO KILL TYPHON, I KNOW NOT HOW. BUT...

  I stepped forward, turning my head as if to listen better. “But?”

  He heaved a huge doggie sigh and tucked his head between his paws, watching Beth work. BUT IF YOU ARE WILLING TO IMPRISON HIM FOR ANOTHER MILLENNIUM OR TWO, OR AT LEAST UNTIL SOMEONE AS FOOLISH AS YOU COMES ALONG AGAIN, I MAY KNOW A WAY.

  Someone as foolish as me? I glanced over at Beth, watching water droplets trail down the back of her neck. She moved her hands from a cut on Emma’s arm to one on the side of her face, chanting repeatedly under her breath and letting the healing magic work.

  Why did I get the feeling I’d like Fenrir’s solution even less than I expected?

  Chapter Five

  It might’ve been ninety-eight degrees outside and humid, but with the evening fast approaching, and no clear way back to shore, we needed fire. Fenrir showed me where he kept a stock of driftwood in one of the other halls. Between the two of us, we carried enough back to where Emma and Beth waited to build a huge ring of dry sticks. I was worried they might not light in the humidity, especially since fire spells were not my forte, but I weaved a small bit of magic into one stick and got it going. When It touched it to the circle, it caught almost instantly.

  The fire seen to, I helped Beth move Emma closer to the warmth. I wished we had blankets or dry clothes to put on her so she’d stop shivering, but Fenrir’s fur was the closest thing. The giant wolf sat next to her and curled a fluffy white tail over Emma’s midsection to keep her warm.

  Meanwhile, Beth went to one of the narrow slits in the fort wall to peer out at the harpies still circling.

  I pulled off my socks and shoes and placed them close to the fire to dry before stripping off my shirt to wring out the water. “Are they ever going to lea
ve? And where’d they come from anyway?”

  Beth slid away from the window and placed a board back in front of it. “Typhon probably sent them.”

  YES, BUT NOT AFTER YOU. Fenrir’s tongue lolled out and he panted. TYPHON CAN LIKELY SENSE THAT I AM HERE.

  “And he thinks a couple of bird ladies could take you out?” I squeezed the last of the water from my t-shirt and pulled it back on. Damp, but better.

  Beth pushed away from the wall, taking her black staff in hand. “Typhon isn’t stupid. He has to know a couple of harpies wouldn’t be enough to kill you, Fenrir.”

  THEY ARE HERE TO ENSURE I DO NOT LEAVE MY HIDING PLACE. Fenrir turned his head, tilting it like a dog that had picked up on some sound humans couldn’t hear. He gave the sound his full attention for a moment, then relaxed.

  “So, he either wants you to leave Loki and join his side,” I said, “or to kill you himself.”

  WITH TYPHON, IT IS HARD TO SAY. HE’S A WILD FORCE OF NATURE, UNLIKE THE REST OF US. POWERFUL. WHEN WE STORMED THE HEART OF THE GODS, HE WAS UNINTERESTED IN DEPOSING THEM. TYPHON ONLY CHALLENGED ZEUS AFTER THE REST OF US WERE IMPRISONED. UNLIKE US, HE HAD NO DESIRE TO RULE, ONLY TO AVENGE, TO HURT AND DESTROY. HE IS RAGE UNLEASHED, AND I DO NOT THINK HE IS COMING HERE TO MAKE DEALS.

  Something dark flashed in Fenrir’s eyes. It was there a moment and gone the next, but I didn’t miss it. I could swear the temperature in the fort dropped a few degrees.

  I shivered. “You said there was a way to imprison him though. I’d like to hear it.”

  The wolf shifted his weight from one paw to the other and peered into the fire. It leapt and jumped in his eyes as if it were alive. BRACE YOURSELF.

  “Brace myself?” I stood. “For what?”

  Magic hit me like a dump truck. It plowed over me, forcing me to the ground where it crushed my chest and kept me from breathing. Air exited my lungs in a desperate wheeze and tears squeezed from the corners of my eyes.

  “You’re going to kill him,” Beth said, but she did nothing to stop the crushing pain.

  HE NEEDS TO SEE TO UNDERSTAND.

  I squeezed my eyes closed, gritted my teeth and tried to fight whatever Fenrir was doing to me, pushing my own magic against his.

  The painful spell suddenly lifted. My eyes snapped open only to find I was no longer in the narrow hall at Fort Pike. Icy blue walls stretched high, reflecting a dancing light somewhere off to my right. I turned my head and watched a black flame dance inside an iron basket, giving off sparks of crimson, goldenrod, and indigo. The colors layered, one over another, always flickering but never touching.

  Gathered around the basket were giants, each one as tall as a mountain and seated in even larger chairs. Hands as large as my whole body gripped horn cups or picked at the bones of some huge beast.

  I pushed myself up. The surface I stood on was a wooden, rectangular slab. A table for giants.

  “It must be done.” The voice of one of the giants boomed as he took to his feet. He was a hard-faced giant with a thick, curling beard. Despite the freezing cold, he wore only a simple white garment clasped at his shoulder. His features blurred as if I were looking at him through a dirty mirror. His eyes smoked. No, they were smoke, white clouds streaming up from his eye sockets and he sneered out at the crowd of giants at the table. “He is a threat to all of us.”

  “I have seen no proof he is a threat to anyone but you, Zeus.” The speaker was a giant woman with golden cat ears and a golden chain around her neck. More gold snaked through her black hair and tipped her fingers in what looked like prosthetic cat claws.

  Zeus sneered at the cat-woman-giant. “Do you think Typhon will stop with me? His rage knows no bounds. No Titan can be allowed to roam free. He will destroy us all!”

  “What you are asking us to do will have the same result.”

  I recognized the voice but couldn’t place it. Not until I turned around and found myself face to face with the goddess Vesta. The version of her at the table had no laugh lines, and a younger disposition than the one I had killed, but there was no mistaking it was her.

  Vesta stood, placing her fingertips gently on the table before her. “We gods have had our quarrels over the years, both with each other and with the mortals. But there is no need to create such a weapon as this. There must be another way.”

  “We have already looked for another way.” Every head at the table turned toward the far end where a wrinkled and gray-haired god sat, hands folded, head bowed. A raven perched on each shoulder, peering out over the crowd. He raised his head, revealing a simple cloth patch draped over one eye. “We have consulted the Fates, the Norns, and heard the cries of all the Oracles below. The message is clear. One sacrifice from every branch of the tree, one god, one human, one from above, and one of the ancient race of gods from before who’ve fled to Underhill. Only when that blood is shed, and bound to the final sacrifice can Typhon’s rage be contained. It will take the blood of one of us. There is no denying that. The only question left to ask is who is brave enough to die so that the rest may live?”

  Chairs creaked as the gods shifted, each looking to the others to volunteer.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I grumbled. “What a bunch of cowards. Their deaths aren’t even permanent. Assholes get to come back eventually.” But if there was one thing I knew about gods, it was that they feared death above all else.

  I blinked and the vision suddenly ended. I was on my back in the damp halls of Fort Pike again, a fire crackling off to my side. Every bone in my body ached and my skin tingled with the feeling of retreating magic.

  “Ungh,” I said and put a hand on my head. “What was that?”

  A MEMORY.

  I sat up.

  Fenrir hadn’t moved from his place next to the fire, staring at me, though the fire in his eyes had died.

  “Did they do it?” I asked. “Did one of those cowards finally step in?”

  THEY ARGUED FOR A TIME. MANY THOUSANDS OF HUMANS DIED IN THE WARS THAT FOLLOWED. MANY GODS. IN THE END, THE BLOOD OF A FALLEN GOD, ONE WHOSE NAME HAS BEEN LONG FORGOTTEN, WAS USED. ALONG WITH THE BLOOD OF THE OTHER SACRIFICES, A WEAPON OF GREAT POWER WAS CAST AND GIVEN TO ZEUS. BUT EVEN WITH ALL THAT POWER, HE COULD ONLY MAIM TYPHON. IT WAS HADES’ QUICK ACTION AND THE FIRST OF THE FOUR WHO BOUND HIM IN TARTARUS.

  “First of the four?”

  “The first Four Horsemen,” Beth said.

  Fenrir confirmed it with a nod.

  I rubbed my chin. The one-eyed god—who I assumed was probably Odin—had given a list of all the sacrifices needed. One sacrifice from every branch of the tree, one god, one human, one from above, one from below, and one of the ancient race of gods from before who’ve fled to Underhill. Only when that blood is shed, and bound to the final sacrifice can Typhon’s rage be contained.

  The god and human would be easy enough for me to get. I couldn’t just use any innocent person. It’d have to be someone willing, and someone who deserved it. If push came to shove, it was a role I would step in to fill. Wouldn’t be the first time I’d put my life on the line to save the people of New Orleans.

  One from above? I wasn’t even sure what that meant, but since I’d recently stumbled on the existence of angels and demons, that seemed to fit. Good luck getting either side to take one for the team. Most angels were too absorbed in their own problems. The only one I knew was Moses Moses and no way was I going to ask him to give up his life for the cause. But maybe he knew someone else.

  The ancient race of gods that fled to Underhill probably meant the fae. According to some legends, they were gods and goddesses a long time ago before a battle forced them to retreat. Over time, as belief waned, they were reduced to fae instead of gods. I didn’t know how true that was, but I did know a lot of fae. As the King of the Court of Miracles, I could demand any of the fae in my court participate, but I wasn’t going to. The best I could hope for was that I could get a message to Remy. Maybe she had a troublemaker that needed dealing with.

&nbs
p; Any of those tasks could go wrong. I could fail or be unable to find a sacrifice in time. With less than a week before Typhon made landfall, I couldn’t afford to screw up even once.

  “I get the rest of it,” I said looking up to Fenrir. “But what was that bit about the final sacrifice?”

  THE WEAPON MUST BE DELIVERED INTO THE HEART OF TYPHON BY A HORSEMAN, Fenrir explained. A MORTAL WITH DIVINE POWER. IT WAS FOR THIS REASON THE FOUR WERE ORIGINALLY CONCEIVED. THE GODS BELIEVED THIS TO BE THE END OF TIMES. THE FOUR HORSEMEN RODE TO ALL CORNERS OF THE WORLD TO RETRIEVE SACRIFICES, AND ONE LAID DOWN HIS LIFE WILLINGLY WHEN IT WAS REQUESTED OF HIM.

  “So...the human sacrifice and the Horseman, they can’t be the same people?”

  Fenrir shook his head.

  Beth crossed her arms. “You weren’t thinking of doing this yourself, were you?”

  I turned to frown at her. “I don’t know if I’ll have much of a choice. We’ve only got a week, and I’m not willing to kill some innocent person, even if it is to stop a Titan.”

  “You killed Hades with barely a second thought.” She leveled her gaze at me, searching for any crack in my armor.

  I shrugged it off. “I did what I had to so I could save my daughter. I’ll do it again if it comes down to it, but never as a first option.”

  Fenrir tilted his head to the side again. YOU MUST REALIZE THIS IS AN IMPOSSIBLE TASK. YOU ONLY BARELY SURVIVED GETTING TO MY HIDING PLACE, AND I AM NOT HALF THE TITAN TYPHON IS. NOT ONLY MUST YOU COMPLETE ALL THE SACRIFICES IN TIME, BUT YOU MUST FASHION A WEAPON AND SAIL OUT TO MEET HIM. YOU MUST BATTLE TYPHON AND STAB HIM IN THE HEART WITH THE WEAPON YOU’VE MADE. THE LIKELIHOOD THAT YOU WILL SUCCEED IS SO SMALL, EVEN I CANNOT FATHOM IT.

  I smiled and lifted my head. “Never tell me the odds.”

  “Okay, then, Mr. Hero.” Beth tugged the wooden shutter back from the window. “How do we get past the harpies and back to shore so we can get started? Especially with her as dead weight?” She gestured to Emma.